New Year's Posterity And How My Posterior will Never Be the Same

Since pushing three children out of my uterus, my new year's celebrations have been relatively tame. It's not as though I lost the urge to party like it's 1999 with every subsequent pregnancy. It's more I have no desire to try and find a sitter who would generally end up to be some drugged out tween with more body piercings than I have and then be forced to fork over hundreds of my husband's hard earned dollars all for the privilege of dancing on a few speakers and blowing into a noise maker at midnight and then whispering and and whimpering for an ice pack, dried toast and some facking tylenol, please, the next day.

(That is a lovely run on sentence. My grade nine teacher would be proud.)

Instead of paying for that misery, I thought to myself, how could I do that for less? What could be better? And more painful?

Hmmm....Something that includes the children, is cheap and fun. And includes alcoholic beverages. Cuz it's new year. (Like I need a reason to crack open the vino....)

In my lovely twisted brain, a mental image sprung forth, and our new year's party was born.

We're having a skating party.

Cuz nothing says "Happy New Year!" like falling on your ass while being circled by small children wearing knives on their feet as you are slightly inebriated.

Never mind the fact I haven't been on skates since I was ten. That would be 22 years ago for those of you doing the math.

Never mind the fact I don't own skates. I do own a pond. That's all I need.

(Well, common sense would help too...)

So the hubs bought me some skates shoveled off the pond to make way for the big night. Common sense told me I better at least try my skates on before having hordes of people descend to my house to witness my ass breaking so the family and I bundled up and trudged out to the pond.

My pond. Where the only cracks in the ice tend to be when my ass hits the surface.



Hence, why I say I live in the sticks. I'm surrounded by them.



It was painfully obvious the moment I stood up on my skates for the first time in two decades that this was a FACKING stupid idea. I figured that out the moment my ass hit the ground. Which was ONE second after I stood up.

My darling husband and my loving children never laughed so hard in their short little lives. Which are now going to be a whole lot shorter since they've wounded my ego. Heh. (I kid. Kinda.)

After slipping and sliding and begging for the ice to crack and swallow me whole, I finally managed to skate a short length. Except I forgot how to stop. So down I went again.

While my husband took pictures and cackled about how I've been brought down by my own stupidity and my children howled with laughter. AND NO ONE OFFERED TO HELP ME UP.

Ya. So they knew if they tried to pull me up I'd yank them right down into the gutter with me. Still, they could have at least pretended.

Look, I'm a dancing queen. Quick, snap the damn picture! I'm losing my balance!!

And no, I'm not sharing those photos with you. They've mysteriously been deleted. I don't know what happened.

Wink, wink.

After an hour of so, I finally found my skating legs which I feared had been lost in time along with my perky boobs and taut stomach muscles. I can once again skate. It's not pretty, but I can live with that.

I can now actually participate in my brilliant idea. At least until my ass becomes more bruised than my fragile ego. Then I'll stick to the snow banks and just serve booze. I mean, egg nog.

Two seconds later they were dragging my sorry carcass off the ice while I whimpered for mercy. Is it me, or is the ice harder than it was when we were little?

My guests are in for a spectacular show tonight. And I'm not talking about the fireworks I bought at the local gas station, either.

He he.

May your new year be filled with much love and joy. And decidedly less bruises than mine.

Another Christmas Bites The Dust

I'm not at all sad to see Christmas day come and gone. It always amuses me that I shop for months, spend hours of my life wrapping presents and sweat half day slaving away in a kitchen; all for the day to pass in a swift blur with nothing but some photographic evidence, a few garbage bags stuffed with ripped packaging and a closet full of plastic crap toys to show for it. All that and a headache too.

(Although, I confess, mine may have been well deserved and of the vino variety.)

Family gatherings and holidays in general still bring the tender hurt out in my heart. It's hard not to be hyper-aware there is one little body, one small boy who isn't taking up floor space, drooling on the hardwood and wondering when he will be able to get his hands on that empty box sitting in the corner.

Yet I found it distinctly difficult to sink into a maudlin funk as my four year old niece sat on my lap and tried to stuff a candy cane in my ear while I watched a roomful of other beloved children wiggle and giggle with Christmas excitement.

Like my favorite chocolate, Christmas will now and forever be bittersweet.

A balm to our wounded souls is our family knows how to have a good time. A good time which includes renting a city transit bus, stuffing it full of a dozen or more excited and noisy children, some slightly tipsy parents all holding their own personal thermos of magical Christmas elixir and going on a tour of the city to appreciate the season's light show.





The neighbours were all peaking out their windows, wondering what the hell we were up to.

Picture a herd of small children running up and down the aisle, squealing with delight as the bus jostled down city streets as the cool older children sat at the back of the bus screeching out Christmas carols at the top of their lungs while we parents sat and tried to ignore them all.










Festive, and safe. The best type of Christmas there is.

(My ears are still ringing two days later.)

That was only the start of our Christmas celebrations. It got better from there.

(But never any quieter.)

A new holiday classic was created when Boo's three year old nephew mistook Boo's groin for a candy cane and nearly castrated my darling husband. Picture a pretty blonde boy hanging one inch to the left of Boo's package while Boo tried to entice him off with sweets and swallow the dirty words that surely sprung to mind.

How I wished I had a camera in my hands at that moment.

Thankfully, no manhood or any parts thereof, where injured by the misguiding chomping of a sweet three year old's pearly whites. Boo's inner thigh now sports a nice set of teeth marks, but worst yet, his ego is slightly bruised by the fact we adults were much to busy laughing to offer sympathy (or help) during his time of crisis.

(In our defense, we may have been slightly tipsy.)

Then there was the traditional unwrapping of my thoughtfully wrapped packages on Christmas morning. It doesn't get any better than watching your children's eyes light up like a Christmas tree when they discover what was hidden underneath the ribbons and bows just for them.

I will never grow tired of that joy.

Toss in some magic moments when I kicked everybody's butt in a game of Monopoly, and it turned out to be a Christmas I could really sink my teeth into. (Not that I'm competitive or bragging or any such thing...)

Boo had his moment too, as I was sadly robbed of victory. While I put in a good effort, I knew I was beat when I spied my professionally wrapped parcel. My cries of "Cheater!" fell on deaf ears when I ripped open the paper.





My preciousssss, my preciousssss.

Suddenly I was distracted by gigabytes and hard drives. It's always hard to admit defeat, but somehow stroking my shiny new laptop made it that much more bearable.

I have since called a moratorium on all adult gift giving. If I can't win, I don't want to play. Not to mention, at this price rate, soon we will be homeless and bankrupt.

Next year, we're sticking to home made presents. I'm bound to win with all the crafty genes I inherited from my mother flowing through my veins.

Then again, like the season of Christmas itself, duct tape is a wonder.

I hope your Christmas was filled with as much joy and love as mine was.

Magic Moments

There are many things I love about the season of Christmas. The food, the company and all the sparkly decorations strewn about. I can over look the massive consumerism and commercialization of a holy event and even the hordes of cranky shoppers, because I see the magic of this time of year.

What I hate about Christmas is the fact my children expect me to have a personality transplant and morph into Ms. Molly Homemaker. A woman who suddenly wears an apron and pulls freshly baked edible goodies out of the oven while wearing a smile.

Apparently it isn't quite as festive if you are cursing about not watching the time while the smoke detector is screaming and a haze of acrid smoke wafts through the air.

But I love my kids, and I wanted them to have some sort of home-making type of memory with me. (This way when they are deciding to whether to place me in the fancy, licensed seniors home or the shady, back alley discount one, I can play the home making mother card.) So I bought a gingerbread house package. It may not be actually baking, but I'm in the kitchen and food products are involved. Good enough.

It started off well enough. We were all having fun, listening to some carols and munching on the candy. Then disaster struck.







The facking roof fell in. All by itself. I swear, I wasn't touching it. I wasn't even looking at it. I was too busy shoving licorice up my nose and pretending to be a walrus. Yet in it went. And it couldn't just collapse. No, it had to break. Into three pieces.

Why the manufacturers don't send replacement parts in those damn kits, is a freaking mystery.







Just when I was ready to cry and call it quits, my darling husband stepped in and put on his hard hat.

A hero was born that moment. At least in my eyes. There was still a chance I could pull this off and have one Martha Stewart-y type memory to wave in front of my children when they're older.







A little bit of sugary goodness, some cleverness from a cute man, a lot of cheerleading from Fric and Frac and me in the back ground still stuffing candy into my nose while keeping a safe distance from the highly breakable cookie house, and viola! Problem solved.













Turned out pretty nice, if I say so myself.







It was a Christmas miracle.

From my family to yours, Merry Christmas everyone!